So! The new hotness is for the Government to rein in inflation by raising interest rates (a move long-overdue, but now delayed so long as to be guaranteed to lead to catastrophe), in order to...
Wait for it...
Cool down the overheated economy. Yes.
Because the current bout of runaway inflation is happening because the economy is doing so well, and productivity is up, and, er. Wait a minute.
How about: yes, the money-printing and easy credit are certainly factors, but one really big factor is shortages. It's not an increased supply of money chasing the same quantity of goods, oh no. It's an increased supply of money chasing a reduced (and ever-shrinking) quantity of goods.
What we need now is not just less production of money but more production of goods. The actual economy - the productive part - needs to be encouraged, not cooled down.
But that's not something Big Brother is good at. Fighting inflation by raising costs, sure. (Wait, what? Yes, that's a popular proposal right now. You could look it up.) Promoting abundant and efficient production of goods, no. That's the sort of thing a free market would be good at, if only we had one.
(Yes, some of the current price surge is due to free markets at work: some goods, notably petroleum products, are being sold overseas because prices are even higher in foreign parts, reducing the domestic supply.)
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